Product Update: March 2019

Hey, Harry here from OpenRent’s Product Development Team.

We’ve launched some handy new features over the last month or so. I’m going to tell you all about them.

Landlord Compliance Tool

Over the last six years, landlords have seen so many new regulations. It’s no surprise that lots of you have been telling us how hard it is to keep track of your legal requirements when renting out a property.

All of the certificates listed there are valid for a year. That means you can set the renewal date as 12 months after your most recent certificate.

Once we have those dates, we’ll send you an email and SMS reminder before they come due again, to make sure you don’t miss your renewal date.

The legal consequences for not having the correct certification in place can be really damaging, so we want to do as much as we can to make sure you’re compliant – for the safety of your tenants, and your investment.

Rent Now Improvements

Next time you use Rent Now, you’ll see a slew of small improvements to help things move smoothly towards a happy tenancy.

Many of them will be ticking away in the background, but here are two big ones we’re excited about.

Rent in Advance

Lots of you like to take multiple months’ rent in advance. You can now do this through Rent Now! Tenants will be able to pay the rent in advance as part of the move-in moneys.

You can find this option in the ‘Advanced Contract Settings’ section when you’re at the contract-drafting stage of Rent Now.

It’s great for adding extra security to a tenancy; for example, when a tenant fails referencing and can’t provide a guarantor to add to their application.

Easier to Initiate Rent Now

You told us that it can be difficult to get Rent Now started sometimes. So now you’ll find we have a whole new page that helps out with getting Rent Now started.

It shows you all your properties, and all the people that have enquired about that property.

And with every enquirer, you have the option to send them a message requesting that they place a holding deposit on your property. When you use that option, we’ll get in touch with them to help them place that holding deposit, beginning the Rent Now process.

Previously, you had to message the tenant to ask them to press the button. Now you can do it yourself!

Cool, huh?

Tell us what to build next!

That’s all for our product update! Hope you find the new features useful. Just post in our Community with ideas for stuff you’d like to see!

Notable Replies

It really depends!
We’ve had many adverts made and let on the same day before.
Other times, if a landlord is advertising a few months in advance of the property being available, it can take weeks to go from viewing to moving in.
The timeline generally is faster in large cities and slower in more rural areas. Tenants and landlords should discuss their ideal timelines at the earliest possible chance - such as while messaging or at the viewing.
The part of the process that takes the most time i…

Hey everyone! So you think OpenRent should develop an app?
We’d love to know if you think that, and if so, why?
Best of all would be if you could answer this question:
Is there anything you want an app to do that isn’t currently possible when browsing the OpenRent website from a mobile device?
We love taking your feedback on board and using it to make our product even better for tenants and landlords!
Thanks!
Sam